Jackie Hance never thought that the weekend getaway for her
three daughters would end in a tragic accident. Jackie's
sister-in-law, Diane, was going to take the children and go
camping for a weekend. Everything was fine until the ride
home. Jackie gets a phone call from her daughter, saying
Aunt Diane was acting strange. Jackie tries to keep calm, as
she calls the local police and explains what is happening.
Warren, Jackie's husband, and his father go to a rest stop
they were hoping Diane had stopped at. Once Warren gets
there, there is no van and no Diane. Soon the police come,
and they take him to the nearby hospital. At the hospital
Warren is giving the bad news. Two of his daughters are
dead, and the third is fighting for her life. His sister
Diane is dead, along with one of her children. Warren and
Jackie's third daughter doesn't make it. Jackie now has to
come to terms with losing her daughters and her sister-in-
law, while learning that Diane was drunk.
Jackie is in her own little world. People are shocked by the
news of this tragic accident and are trying to help her. No
one will leave her alone. After the funeral, Jackie feels
the only way she can get though this is to join her
daughters in heaven. She sets a time line for when she will
take her own life.
Jackie and Warren are fighting over everything. Nothing is
the same any more. Her friends suggest she have another
child. Not to replace the three she lost, but so maybe she
can get on with her life. With her home life in a mess,
Jackie at first feels this is just not the right thing to
do, but she does get pregnant and is blessed with the birth
of another child.
I'LL SEE YOU AGAIN by Jackie Hance with Janice Kaplan is a
very hard book to review. I lost a nephew to a drunk driver.
I don't know how Jackie and Warren carried on with their
lives. I have to say, Jackie is one of the most courageous
woman I have read about. She gets though all of the pain and
sorrow that goes with losing those you love. Jackie does
forgive Diane but still doesn't understand why this had to
happen. I'LL SEE YOU AGAIN is a very good book, but get out
the Kleenexes; it is a tearjerker.
In a powerful and intimate memoir, Jackie Hance shares her story of unbearable loss, darkest despair, and—slowly, painfully, and miraculously—her cautious return to hope and love. Until the horrific car accident on New York State’s Taconic Parkway that took the lives of her three beloved young daughters, Jackie Hance was an ordinary Long Island mom, fulfilled by the joyful chaos of a household bustling with life and chatter and love. After the tragedy, she was “The Taconic Mom,” whose unimaginable loss embodied every parent’s worst nightmare. Suddenly, her life-long Catholic faith no longer explained the world. Her marriage to her husband, Warren, was ravaged by wrenching grief and recrimination. And her mind, unable to cope with the unfathomable, reinvented reality each night, so she awoke each morning having forgotten the heartbreaking facts: that Emma, age 8; Alyson, age 7; and Katie, age 5, were gone forever. They were killed in a minivan driven by their aunt, Jackie’s sister-in-law, Diane Schuler, while returning from a camping weekend on a sunny July morning. I’ll See You Again chronicles the day Jackie received the traumatizing phone call that defied all understanding, and the numbed and torturous events that followed—including the devastating medical findings that shattered Jackie to the core and shocked America. But this profoundly honest account is also the story of how a tight-knit community rallied around the Hances, providing the courage and strength for them to move forward. It’s a story of forgiveness, hope, and rebirth, as Jackie and Warren struggle to rediscover the possibility of joy by welcoming their fourth daughter, Kasey Rose Hance. The story that Jackie Hance shares for the first time will touch your heart and warm you to the power of love and hope.